We preferred the look of the first 6700, but the Nokia 6700 Slide is nevertheless a stylish and compact device with a clear, bright screen.
User Friendliness Summary for Nokia 6700 Slide
The Slide has all the simplicity and logic we’ve come to expect from Nokia phones.
Feature Set Summary for Nokia 6700 Slide
The standout features on this otherwise basic phone are the five-megapixel camera and 3G, but access to the Ovi Store is another big plus, allowing you to download apps and games and pimp up your phone to your heart’s content.
Performance Summary for Nokia 6700 Slide
Everything works quickly and intuitively, from typing to taking photos.
Battery Power Summary for Nokia 6700 Slide
The 180 minutes’ talktime should last you very well.
Full Review and Specification for the Nokia 6700
Nokia is never afraid to try something new with its phones, ploughing new furrows in design and features, but it’s the classic, easy-to-use phones that have kept it on top for so long and kept Nokia users loyal to the manufacturer for years.
It was late to the touch-screen party, perhaps because it knows the value of familiarity, but has now found its feet there too. The Nokia 6700 Slide is a good combination of touch-screen technology and Nokia simplicity.
Style and handling on the Nokia 6700 Slide
The 6700, released last year, was a beautifully designed handset with a chrome finish. The Nokia 6700 Slide offers similar stylishness with a bigger screen and the compact size afforded by a slide-out keypad. We prefer the shiny glossiness of the original 6700 to the Slide’s matte-silver body, but it looks good nevertheless and should draw some admiring glances.
Beneath the 2.2-inch screen sit a large D-pad and four large buttons, for call and call end, menu and home. The home key takes you to your home screen from anywhere you happen to be and if you press it from your home screen it goes to the menu icons. The keypad, revealed with a gently sprung slide mechanism, is almost completely flat except for the small ridges between the keys, which are curved to match the shape of the base of the handset. Flat keys aren’t always the most comfortable to use, but the size of these means you’ll have no problems whipping off messages.
The D-pad is especially useful for navigating the home screen. As well as the regular on-screen info like your network, time and date, signal strength and battery power, there’s a line of icons across the bottom of the screen that you can scroll over using the D-pad. These include Facebook, camera launch, the clock setting and more. An icon on the home screen takes you directly to Ovi Store, Nokia’s apps download service. It’s not as fully stocked as Apple, for example, but new apps are appearing at an impressive rate.
Media on the Nokia 6700 Slide
The home screen should appeal to everyone: simple enough not to get in the way of people who just want to make calls; full enough to keep more demanding users amused. It’s hardly a smartphone, and the low-price means we can’t really expect features like GPS or Wi-Fi, but there’s 3G and a front-facing camera if you want to make video calls.
You can configure the phone to let you end calls either by closing the slide or pressing call end. Make sure you get it right – you don’t want to say something inappropriate when you think you’re put the phone down only to realise the listener is still on the other end.
The five-megapixel camera has LED flash and autofocus. Like most cameraphones, it takes a few moments to shoot after you’ve pressed the button but the autofocus ensures a good view. The results aren’t bad for quick snaps and sharing photos with friends.
The verdict on the Nokia 6700 Slide
For a decently priced, good-looking handset that does the basics well, is easy to use and has a couple of little extras thrown in, you could do a lot worse than the Nokia 6700 Slide.
